The citizen's income is the only solution to inequality/ the poverty trap/ social immobility.

[weatherall]

The concept of the citizen's income is a universal benefit everyone receives.

It provides a basic standard of living eg housing/food/clothes/fuel.

Any income earned above this is kept. There is no taper.

I hope Labour's policy people are reading. They need to be thinking differently. They are starting to already if the £1k paternity payment is any indicator.

Again - from my post - where is this mystical money comig from - easy enough to spend, harder to earn.
Take Roman abramovich - 50th richest person on the world - $14 billion.
spread over the world that is £1.40 each
spread over the UK, it is c£1,200 each
where is the cash for this?

carol at the same time you introduce CI, you simultaneously abolish personal tax allowance and several welfare benefits, so, if you set it at the right level, it is cost neutral.

People have done the maths in Canada, where there is less money in benefits when you are unemployed or disabled.

Well well well. Milton Friedman was a supporter of the idea. I never would have guessed. Good link Terry

I thought it was odd that it was also a right-wing theory. Less government I suppose.

Something both fringes agree on!

I stumbled on it in my undergrad days - in some very dusty 60s pamphlets. I was surprised to even see it mentioned here. Delighted so many people support it

Clearly a lot less fringe now.

Funny that my two most active threads were this and the one where I appear to be defending capitalism. Am I secretly a right-winger?

Ha!

I think you should sit yourself down and ask yourself some Paxmanesque questions

Mmmmm Paxman. My secret shame. I once frantically watched an auction on eBay for a signed picture of him. I was convinced it would go really high at the end. I think I got it for about 97p in the end. Still has pride of place.

Fine looking man
Very attractive brain too

mrsterrypratchett thanks for the link, but all the experiments appear to have been done where there was no or little social security. The canadian Minicom one made top-up payments to people below a certain income threshold and the Nambian one made payments to subsisdence (sp?) farmers.
Alot of the discussion on-line about these appear to be talking about a top-up benefit, such as the UK minimum income guarantee for pensioners, rather than a flat rate to every household regardless.
also the calculation of $7,800, is about £5,000, so significantly less than required by most people on benefits.

What does happen when someone in this country does blow all their allowances in the first week of a month?

Food bank. Wonga. Horrible debt.

So surely the exact same thing is going to happen with the op's idea?

Unless you simultaneously make places like Wonga subject to a 60% APR cap in fees and interest.

pplease would you raise essentially this objection to any policy change anyone proposed in any area of concern?

Person X: We could introduce scheme Z. It would have A, B and C beneficial effects and would cost very little.

pplease: But a small number of very unfortuante people could continue to the same daft thing they currently do under the current regime under scheme Z. Isn't that a failing of scheme Z?

Person X: Erm no. It's a small number of people doing a daft thing that is beyond government control.

You can't protect people against themselves.

But you havent answered what you would do about them?
Leave them rot in the street or give them some more money?

Why would anything different be needed?

different to today's status quo you mean?

This is not the magical panacea to everything. Charity, MH support, debt support, GA, NA, AA, counselling and the CAB etc. would still be needed.

Why would anything different be needed?

different to today's status quo you mean?

Different in respect of people who do strange things with their money.